The ghostly sight happened just a few days before Halloween.
The shadow of Earth’s closet companion looms large in new footage
The moon cast its shadow upon the Earth in footage captured by satellites run by Eumetsat (European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites) during a partial solar eclipse today (Oct. 25).
At least three views of the haunting imagery were available from the satellites of Meteosat, which operate in geostationary orbit and are tasked with providing weather data to assist with forecasting and long-term predictions of climate change.
“Look near the top of the video, especially on the right hand side: Can you see the moving dark area? That’s the shadow,” tweeted Simon Proud, a senior scientist at the U.K.’s National Centre for Earth Observation and at RAL Space (a part of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.)
Later in the day, Proud provided more footage from Meteosat-9, one of the three operational satellites (along with Meteosats-10 and -11.)
“You can see the shadow of the moon moving from left to right, eventually merging with the darkness of sunset,” he wrote.
The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shared more footage from the satellite, noting that Meteosat-11 is a partner satellite to the agency’s own fleet of meteorological watchers.
“In this #GeoColor imagery, you can see the moon’s shadow travel over the North Atlantic and Europe, before ending over Asia,” NOAA added.
While this was the final solar eclipse of 2022, there’s still more eclipse action in store this year. You can catch the final lunar eclipse of the year on Nov. 8, 2022, with details on how and where to see it located in our lunar eclipse 2022 guide.
If you want more advice on solar eclipse photography to help you prepare for the next solar eclipse, our guides on how to photograph a solar eclipse and the best cameras for astrophotography can help you find the camera gear you need to capture your next best image.
